Congressional leaders briefed on State Dept. warnings

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi said Friday that congressional leadership has been briefed on the decision to close several U.S. embassies in the Muslim world as well as Friday’s international travel warning issued for Americans.

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Rep. Dutch Ruppersberger, ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee, said the decision to close several U.S. embassies came after intelligence detected threats that rose “to another level.”

“The most important thing we have to do is protect American lives so when you have a situation like this, not the regular chitchat, you get chitchat all the time, this got to another level, but I can’t go any further,” the Maryland Democrat told reporters Friday.

Ruppersberger said the decision to close the embassies came as a result of some of the lessons learned after the Sept. 11, 2012, attack on the Consulate in Benghazi, Libya, that killed four Americans including Ambassador Chris Stevens.

“The bottom line is, when you have a threat you think is serious, and you to put it out — and by the way, by putting it out there, that gives notice to the people planning it — we know something is out there,” he said.